C. albicans is an important human fungal pathogen and the most prominent target organism for antifungal research. PMK is an enzyme required for the biosynthesis of isoprene subunits that are used as precursors in the synthesis of sterols, dolichols and ubiquinones. As PMK is an essential biosynthetic enzyme, inhibitors of PMK should find use as antifungal agents. All species synthesise a protein with PMK activity however, across species the enzymes differ considerably in their amino acid sequence. Because of selectivity problems (for example fungal versus human) it is extremely important to optimise potential inhibitors specifically against the fungal target enzymes (i.e. C. albicans or Aspergillus fumigatus) and not against the human enzyme. Such cross-fungal-species inhibitors possess broad specificity. Alternatively, it may be desirable to use an inhibitor which is more selective, for example, one that inhibits C. albicans PMK but not a homologous but non-identical fungal PMK protein such as from Saccharomyces cerevisiae (S. cerevisiae).
In view of the increased incidence of fungal resistance to existing anti-fungal agents and fuelled by the growing number of fungal infections particularly in people with immunodeficiency disorders, organ transplants and cancer, there is a need for new means of identifying potential anti-fungal agents.